El Super Bowl? How Bad Bunny is changing the face of Latin pop

Bad Bunny is carrying the torch of the superstar musicians who came before him. But he's also bringing his own fuego.

By now, it's no secret that the reggaeton juggernaut, born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, is poised to make history at the Apple Music Super Bowl LX Halftime Show on Feb. 8. While not the first Latin singer to grace the world's biggest stage (Jennifer Lopez and Shakira, Gloria Estefan, Christina Aguilera, Enrique Iglesias), Bad Bunny is the first predominantly Spanish-language artist to headline the halftime show.

The feat adds to a record-setting career for the Puerto Rican singer, who's won album of the year at the Grammy Awards (the first Spanish-language album to do so), topped the Billboard 200 chart four times and performed as a solo headliner at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

"He has followed in the footsteps of many other people who have paved the way for him to get to this place," Vanessa Diaz, author of "P FKN R: How Bad Bunny Became the Global Voice of Puerto Rican Resistance," tells USA TODAY. "The list of firsts for him is endless. ... And I think what he is doing is setting a precedent to make it so that he's not the last."

From the "Latin Explosion" of the late '90s and early 2000s to the reggaeton boom of the mid-aughts, Latin music has long captivated American audiences. But since his 2016 debut, Bad Bunny has emerged as the leader of a new cohort of barrier-breaking artists, among them Karol G, J Balvin, Anitta and Peso Pluma, who are globalizing the genre and redefining crossover appeal with their fierce cultural pride.

"The Super Bowl halftime show is going to be one that we're going to talk about forever because it's already so historical that regardless of what happens in the wake of it, it's incredibly meaningful," Diaz says. "We've never had a Latin artist at this level, ever."

Why Bad Bunny's Spanish is musical and political 'resistance'

English, Spanish, Spanglish ‒ it doesn't matter. Bad Bunny's music is its own universal language.

Unlike many of his Latin pop predecessors, who released songs in English in hopes of broadening their audience, the singer has not recorded any full-length English material across his six studio albums.

In the wake of Bad Bunny's halftime show selection in September, many critics raised concerns about a potential language barrier for English-language viewers. Three months later, Bad Bunny was recognized by Spotify Wrapped as the top global artist of 2025 (meanwhile, his 2022 album "Un Verano Sin Ti" is the all-time most-streamed album on the platform).

His "reclamation of the Spanish language" is not only groundbreaking on a musical level, says Latin music scholar Jennifer Mota, but can also dismantle the cultural and political stigma driving criticism of his non-English performance.

"White supremacy and imperialism have traditionally elevated English and White musicians as universal and 'global' products," Mota says. "Bad Bunny is programming resistance and awareness, and at the same time, claiming space in the Spanish language, a language that has often been made to be seen as a niche."

Bad Bunny throws out industry rulebook with Latin pride

Bad Bunny may be a Hollywood A-lister nowadays, but his Latinidad remains front and center.

At last year's Met Gala, the singer customized his brown Prada suit with a revamped pava, a traditional Puerto Rican straw hat. For his first concert residency, which wrapped in September, Bad Bunny passed on the Las Vegas Strip and opted for a 31-date series in his native Puerto Rico.

And while hosting "Saturday Night Live" in October, he recreated the classic Spanish-language sitcom, "El Chavo del Ocho," for one of his sketches.

The singer's patriotic nods to his Latino heritage are not just cultural gestures, Diaz says, but signal a political consciousness in his work that makes Bad Bunny's meteoric rise all the more remarkable.

"He's really done a lot of things differently that most people would say would hurt someone's career, like being increasingly political," Diaz says. "What that does is bolster this feeling of authenticity and actually makes him more relatable.

"When other artists might be more straightforward and forceful with their political perspectives, his is always linked to this very clear [sense of] 'This is about who I am and where I come from.'"

Bad Bunny's fashion rebellion is a game changer

For Bad Bunny, fashion is less about what you wear and more about who you are.

Over the years, the singer and red-carpet darling has become known for his androgynous style and LGBTQ+-inspired performances. Following his selection as the halftime show headliner, some critics attacked his unconventional aesthetic, with former ESPN columnist Jason Whitlock predicting he will put on a "drag show."

Bad Bunny is not the first pop star to push gender and sexuality norms, says Verónica Dávila Ellis, assistant professor of Spanish and Latinx Studies at James Madison University. However, his androgynous style has allowed him to not only distinguish his artistic persona but also to challenge the hyper-masculine image long expected of male Latin singers, especially in the macho-heavy Latin urbano scene.

"In the end, regardless of sexualities, you kind of need to be queer in order to do things differently and to succeed," Ellis says. It was a "smart move to fall into a kind of alternative audience through a lot of those gender-bending, gender-nonconforming (expressions), expanding outside of those very rigid urbano norms."

Bad Bunny has blazed his own trail since day one. But with his Super Bowl performance, he may very well be leaving a path for others to follow.

"When we're thinking about industries that have only celebrated or elevated white American and English-language universal products, this is a moment in which we think about those things," Mota says. "So, if it's Bad Bunny this year, are we going to have an Afrobeats (artist) next year? I'm excited to see the next Bad Bunnies that are going to take up space for years to come."